


The Third Best Holiday

by CantStopImagining



Category: Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Halloween, also theres holtzbert if you really squint????, oops i forgot kevin yet again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-09
Updated: 2017-10-09
Packaged: 2019-01-10 23:16:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12309945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CantStopImagining/pseuds/CantStopImagining
Summary: The Ghostbusters experience their first Halloween together... and it isn't exactly what they'd hoped. Or is it?





	The Third Best Holiday

**Author's Note:**

> Yikes I've really gone rusty when it comes to writing these characters so I'm afraid this is mostly dialogue and probably not my best work, but I've been attempting to write a lot based off prompts this October, and publish them regardless of how I feel about them. I also decided to enter this in Ghostbusters Events' Halloween contest since it's Halloween themed.

“Have I mentioned I freaking hate Halloween?” Abby grumbles as she stomps up the front steps to the firehouse, trudging her heavy proton pack on her back.

Holtzmann’s eyebrows shoot into her hairline, her mouth turning downwards in the corners, an emoji expression, turning away from unlocking the door to stare Abby down, “you can’t hate All Hallow’s Eve; it’s the third best holiday of the year.”

“Third best?” Patty asks, “dare I ask what’s in first and second place?”

“March 2nd - National Dr. Seuss Day - and October 4th - National Taco Day,” Holtzmann pauses, kicking the door open, “you get free Tacos on October 4th.”

Dumping her proton pack down unceremoniously, Abby sinks into the office chair at her desk, “Holtzmann’s right; it’s not the holiday’s fault. It’s people being assholes.”

“We gotta start charging for prank calls!” Patty agrees.

From the doorway, Erin makes a sad whimper in agreement, drenched head to toe in neon green slime. She tries to lift her arms, but they stick to her sides, thick with goo. Holtzmann’s already confiscated her proton pack, laying it down on the downstairs work bench to check for repairs. Her amazement and approval at the pulley system constructed by the frat boys behind the prank had quickly disappeared when it occurred to her that they might have damaged the circuit board on one of her pieces of equipment.

Unsurprisingly, the humour was entirely lost on Erin. She’d been dragged away before she could knock one of the drunken students’ teeth out.

“At least since it’s not real ectoplasm, it ought to wash out a little easier, right?” she says, attempting to brighten her own mood.

Without warning, Holtzmann appears behind her, sniffing at a pool of goo puddling on her shoulder. She dips a finger into it, and before anyone can stop her, sticks it into her mouth, licking it clean.

“Corn syrup, yeast, and food coloring,” she says, nodding to herself, “you’re like a giant lollipop, Erin. I could just lick it off you.”

Erin flushes bright pink.

“I do not want to hear any more of this,” Patty protests, holding her hands up, and striding off towards the kitchen, closely followed by Abby.

“I’ll just go… take… a shower,” Erin says, nodding to herself, a movement which is actually audible as her skin sticks to itself.

“Holler if you need help washing your back,” Holtzmann calls after her, distractedly, her attention having already moved back to fixing the proton pack.

Fortunately, the mechanics of the pack is so tight that no ‘slime’ has managed to penetrate it, though the faraday cage could do with a proper scrub, just in case. Holtzmann carefully unscrews it, laying it out on a piece of cloth to one side of her, and prodding at the wiring underneath. Once she’s sure it’s undamaged, she returns her attention to cleaning. She hums to herself, lost in a world of her own.

“Really, Holtz, the Monster Mash?”

Holtzmann looks up to find Abby watching her from across the room. She’s clearly been there some time, though Holtz didn’t hear her return. She grins.

“Is that what that is?”

“It literally has the words ‘they did the monster mash’ in it.”

Holtzmann frowns, “it does?”

They’re interrupted by the front door buzzer, and Abby groans, flopping dramatically over her desk.

“No. Nope. Not dealing with another one. I get it, it’s Halloween, it’s hilarious to show up here dressed in a white sheet, with little eye holes… yell ‘boo’… Do these people not realise we are a trying to run a serious business here?”

The door buzzes again.

“Someone gonna get that?” Patty yells from the kitchen.

Abby looks meaningfully at Holtzmann, but she’s ensconced in her work again, completely ignoring her surroundings. It’s amazing how she does that, just suddenly switches off… real convenient. Funny how she's always tuned in when the pizza arrives, but never when it comes to handing over the money for it.

“I’ll go,” Abby says, rolling her eyes, making a big show of heaving herself up from her desk, and walking slowly towards the hallway, hoping that whoever is at the door leaves before she reaches it. No such luck - the door buzzes again instead.

Emerging from upstairs in fresh jeans and a sweater, her hair already near-dry, Erin gestures questioningly toward the door, “who’s that?”

“Better not be another dumb-ass in a costume or they gonna suffer at the hands of Abby,” Patty says, drifting in from the kitchen, carrying four cups of coffee, expertly balanced. She distributes them.

Erin frowns, “it’s Halloween - there’s bound to be kids in costumes. I bought candy for them, remember? It’s in the kitchen, right between the chips and that giant bottle of gator aid”

Holtz’s eyebrows raise but she doesn’t say anything.

“Y’all musta loved Halloween as kids, right?” Patty asks, lifting her steaming coffee cup to her face, “you and Abby in your nerdy little costumes, critiquing all the other kids?”

Cheeks turning pink, Erin shakes her head, getting that pained expression on her face that often appears when high school is brought up, “uh… not so much.”

Thankfully, she’s saved from having to elaborate any further on that, because Abby reappears, ushering people in behind her. Judging from her expression, it’s not more pranksters after all. Instead, a meek looking woman walks into the office, looking awkward, hands folded in front of her. Abby looks so excited she’s almost teary-eyed.

“You guys… this is Mara… and Mara’s mom. Mara, come on in, we don’t bite!”

Fortunately, any crude remark that might have been lingering on the tip of Holtzmann’s tongue dies before it can horrify anybody, because the sight of Mara in the doorway knocks her speechless.

The little girl can’t be any older than six. She’s wearing beige overalls, a pair of yellow-lensed glasses nested on a mess of curly brown hair, a broom handle painted silver slung across her shoulders.

She’s the spitting image of Holtzmann. In tiny, dark haired and dark sinned form.

“I didn’t even ask what she wanted to be for Halloween this year… she wouldn’t accept any other costume,” the mom says, smiling softly as Holtzmann comes out from behind her desk, slips her gloves off, and kneels down in front of the kid.

“You look freaking awesome,” she says, a lump in the back of her throat.

“You saved my Daddy from the ghost!” Mara announces, pulling her broom handle off her back and holding it just like a proton wand, firing it at imaginary ghosts with a ‘pow pow’!

Mara’s mom steps forward, “I’m real sorry for dropping in on you all without any warning, but she insisted she needed to show the real Ghostbusters her costume.”

“I take it back,” Abby says, looking from big Holtzmann to little Holtzmann, “I love Halloween.”

**Author's Note:**

> Fun fact: I cosplayed as Erin once and that's the exact mixture I used for slime and I was literally stuck to myself and everything around me all day, so I feel her pain.
> 
> If for some unknown reason you feel like reading more of my October prompts, or fancy requesting something, holler at me on tumblr: brittaisab.


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